How to Streamline Your Business with Effective Systems
Are you a busy mom trying to juggle your family and business responsibilities? Do you struggle with feeling disorganized and overwhelmed? Guess what? You're not alone. I feel the exact same way. Running a business while also managing a household can be a daunting task. Still, there are ways to simplify your workflow and achieve your goals. Let's create effective systems that simplify your business and simplify your life.
Are you wondering exactly how to do that?
Step 1: Identify Your Business Processes
The first step in creating effective systems is to identify the business processes you need to set up to feel more productive and less overwhelmed.
As a busy mom, you likely have many tasks and responsibilities on your plate. Don’t just think inside the business box; there are workflows that you can create in your life as well.
Start by making a complete list of everything you do daily, weekly, and monthly.
Emails, social media accounts, and invoices are a few you might include on this list for your business. Laundry, dishes, whatever, all the things that you do. I want this to be an exhaustive list. Everything that you could possibly think of that you do in a week.
Once you have that list. I want you to analyze each of these processes and determine which ones are essential for your business and which ones can be streamlined or eliminated.
Do you want to know one scary thing I’ve recently had to let go of for now and set on a shelf? My YouTube channel, while I love creating these videos. For this time in my life and business, it was too much. Switching to a podcast has been so much simpler. Instead of one video a week, now I’m putting out 3 podcasts a week. My goal is to have 100 episodes before the end of the year. You should keep me accountable for that.
Now I want you to do that same thing for all those different tasks that you have in your life. Which ones are essential, and which ones can you do away with at this time in your life?
Step 2: Document Your Processes
After that, we'll just document the process, and no, it’s really not that difficult. Documenting your process, though, is critical to ensure that everybody on your team is following that same process and that tasks are getting completed consistently and efficiently.
As a busy mom, you may not have time to oversee every task.
And you should not! I repeat you should not oversee every task in your business. If you can, hire a virtual assistant to help you.
Okay, let me backtrack a little bit. In the beginning, yes you will need to approve work and oversee what is getting done. Providing constructive feedback to ensure that tasks are completed to your satisfaction. After that, trust the people you have working for you. Spot-check and provide feedback in a weekly meeting with your team.
And that is why it's so important to create. Your step-by-step instructions for each task and activity.
Include all of your tools. All the software that is used in your business, create a links spreadsheet and have all that gathered in one spot.
Documentation can also be used to train those new team members and delegate the task to others on your team. For those home tasks, get your kids involved.
I’m not even sure about the age that my oldest was when I outsourced her own laundry to her. Hey, when you travel for work 75% of the time, you have to find ways to get stuff done. She took pictures of everything that we were doing, printed them out, and attached them to note cards. Each note card was a step in the process, from sorting the laundry to setting the on the drier. See how simple that process was? Pictures with notes.
Step 3: Automate Your Processes
You're going to look for different ways to automate the processes. Automating your processes is one of the best ways to save time and reduce the risk of errors or oversight. Again, as a busy mom, you need to prioritize your time and your energy and use technology to handle repetitive tasks and workflow.
Use automation to free your time and energy to focus on the more important task.
There are so many tools and software available that you can use to automate the different tasks. Think. Email marketing, social media, scheduling your invoicing.
I use HoneyBook, which handles all my contracts and invoicing. I can set them up to reoccur.
Think of different software solutions that can save you time. You must not undervalue your time and have a good understanding of how much your time is actually worth.
Because if you spend your time on $10 tasks, that will not grow your business. Those tasks will not move you forward. That is not going to allow you to work part-time hours and get that full-time income that you desire.
Step 4: Effective Systems Use Project Management Tools
Pick a project management tool; just make the decision. And don't second guess yourself.
Grr, second-guessing my decisions is an area that I’m working on. Oh my goodness, the wasted brain space that I’ve used up by being wishy-washy and second-guessing decisions. And this year, I have said no to second-guessing decisions. Because what CEO does that?
If I catch myself, I literally say out loud to myself. “No, cut that out. Stop procrastinating and move on to what you must be doing.”
As for a project management tool. Yes, you need to pick a project management tool. That will help you keep all your tasks and projects organized in one place.
As a busy mom. You need to stay organized and on top of your task.
Options for project management tools include Asana, Clickup, Teamwork, Trello, or MeisterTask.
It doesn't matter what all the cool kids are using. Pick a software, that truly works with your brain.
And doesn't leave you feeling overwhelmed just from using the tool.
It also allows you to be able to assign your tasks to your team members, set deadlines, track your progress, and communicate with your team members in one central location.
When you use tools for your project management, you can ensure that everybody on your team is on the same page and you're working towards the same goals.
Which will help you achieve your business objectives more effectively. And when I talk about your project management system, I'm just not talking about putting your business tasks in there, put your life task in there as well.
You need to make sure that every task that you have is attached to time in your calendar.
Because if your not attaching time, things are not going to get done. In the beginning this is a bit of trial and error until you figure out how long things take. Cause I’m only guessing you have no idea. Give yourself grace you're going to either schedule not enough time or you're going to schedule too much time.
Give it your best shot and adjust as needed, I only ask that you make sure that every task that you have is attached to time in your day. So it gets done.
Little Side Note
An amazing tool I’ve discovered for attaching time to your activities is Sunsama. It has a little timer at the top so you can see that you’re not overbooking yourself.
Here is a referral link if you’d like to check it out. Affiliate Disclaimer: As with any link I share, it’s a tool that I’m using or have used. I may or may not receive a commission at no additional cost.
Step 5: Continuously Review and Improve Your Systems
Don't forget to continuously review and improve your systems. Because your systems will change as your business grows. As you bring on more team members.
Start by creating one effective system. That's the first step. That's all you need to do.
As a busy mom, it's so important to continuously review and improve your systems.
Regularly assessing your progress, identifying any areas that you need to improve on and implementing changes as needed.
When you regularly asses your systems it will help you stay ahead of the game. Ensuring that your systems are always optimize for maximizing efficiency and effectiveness.
This allows you to simplify your life and your business, while still achieving your goals.
Thank you so much for reading. I appreciate you and I hope you have a wonderful week.
